Flint, Michigan Factory History

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1975 Catalytic Converter

When General Motors first started installing these on the new 1975 Buick’s we were not prepared for the smell in the factory. They claimed in this advertisement that it was a breath of fresh air. “Actually they smelled horrible”. I was working on the chassis line in factory #04 at the time, adjacent to the final line. My partner and I thought that the foul smell was coming from another employee working next to us. Management left it up to the union rep to talk with this person, and he had a personal hygiene talk with him. After the poor guy went home to shower we still had the smell. It was finally tracked down to the (fresh air) converter. We felt pretty bad about this and apologized to our fellow worker but I’m not sure he ever accepted our stupid blunder.